The subject matter discussed in this section should not be assumed to be prior art merely as a result of its mention in this section. Similarly, a problem mentioned in this section or associated with the subject matter provided as background should not be assumed to have been previously recognized in the prior art. The subject matter in this section merely represents different approaches, which in and of themselves may also correspond to implementations of the claimed technology.
The first dashboard consisted of a board placed in front of the driver of a carriage to shield him from debris cast off the horses' hooves. As vehicles became more complex, and mechanical motive power supplanted the horse, controls for various systems (environmental, safety, entertainment and so forth) proliferated. The dashboard was retained as a convenient place for various controls. The operator's attention must be removed from the road (or runway, rail or sea-lane) to “hunt” for the knob or switch, hopefully labelled in his or her own language. In the 1970s, replacing English language labels with international symbols made the dashboard equally non-understandable to everyone everywhere. The need arose for a more simplified interface became apparent and joysticks, keyboards or keypads, glass cockpits, etc. have been pressed into service. But complexity—and confusion—still proliferated.
Some have looked to motion capture to provide the interface. Conventional motion capture approaches, however, rely on markers or sensors worn by the subject while executing activities and/or rely on the strategic placement of numerous bulky and/or complex equipment in specialized and rigid environments to capture subject movements. Unfortunately, such systems tend to be expensive to construct and impractical to use in the vehicle cabin. Markers or sensors worn by the operator can be cumbersome and interfere with natural movement. Optical based systems involve large numbers of cameras and tend not to operate in real time, due to the volume of data that needs to be analyzed and correlated. Changing and uncontrollable lighting situations, background objects, etc. pose further challenges to the use of optical components. To date, such considerations have limited the deployment and use of motion capture technology in the vehicle cabin to little more than non-functional pipe dreams.
Consequently, there is a need for providing the ability to interact with the vehicle control environment without having to fumble around for buttons, switches, joysticks and so forth in real time without fixed or difficult to configure sensors or markers.